Cloud-Walking and Construction · 2:17pm Dec 10th, 2014
The ability of pegasi to walk on and shape clouds is well known, but how do they do that? It is their magical talent to manipulate water that is at the heart of that ability. For example, when a pegasus touches a cloud, magic extends from the pegasus into the vapor, forming a network of bonds between every molecule of water within that pony's range. The strength of the bond is such that it feels much like walking on a firm trampoline, but the limitations of the effect means that any non-pegasus will feel nothing even when fairly close to the pegasus. This however is merely the reflexive ability of all pegasi – they don't even have to think about it to do it. When moving clouds though, a positive mental effort is required to extend that network throughout the cloud. This is not as firm as when cloud-walking, but it is much more far-reaching, thus enabling pegasi to do many things with clouds. Bucking clouds to dispel them essentially concentrates all that binding magic in the rear hooves, so the clouds actually shatter apart, the resulting energy that they gain preventing them from reforming. One step further is cloud construction. Permanent structures can be created by concentrating their will to pour a lot of their binding magic into clouds, locking them into shape. Ambient magic from the pegasi utilizing the structure keeps the material from losing cohesion. The more that it is used, the more permanence cloud structures achieve. Cloud homes will therefore not dissipate in the absence of their owners for a few days or weeks, depending on age. Cities like Cloudsdale would take years to dissipate if every pegasus abandoned it. All this is achieved through the one magical talent, but only differs in application of it.
There is a drawback to the talent though. It is not without reason that pegasi are poor swimmers. The same ambient magic that binds clouds into firmness, turns water into molasses-like consistency without a positive mental effort to turn it off, which is very difficult for a reflexive ability. Pegasi can easily drown before they can adapt. On the flip side, they can literally walk on water if they choose to make the effort. This is not automatically possible because the density of liquid water opposed to vapor means that it takes far more magic to form the network of bonds, thus limiting the support area. It would be much like trying to stand on slick ice otherwise.
This has been Fun Fanon Fact #3. Suggested by StarChaser01. Have you got a suggestion?
Wow, headcanon is awesome.
Here's a suggestion; explain where earth pony strength comes from. In a contest of strength between an earth pony and unicorn of similar size and build, the earth pony usually wins. How does their magic make them stronger?
While we're at it, how does magic work and where does it come from?
Now that is quite an awesome fanon fact. Would this mean that being in fog would greatly diminish their ability to fly?
Though this has already been disproved in the opener of the 1st season by Dash, it's still food for thought.
Thank you for choosing my suggestion.
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The answer is, "it depends."
One possible explanation is that there are two components to a pony's magic: capacity, and talent. Capacity is a generator, while talents are the appliances powered by it – and since each pony's "generator" has a relatively fixed output level, there's only so much to go around. (Though obviously, different individuals have different capacities.) So when a pegasus is in active flight, most of the energy is going into their flight magic, leaving relatively little left over for the water-binding talent to operate. This, too, is an instinctive reaction; even among individuals who have stronger-than-average magic cores, like Rainbow Dash, it still requires some conscious effort (and a certain amount of practice) to overcome the instinctive switchover and power both talents simultaneously.
For the average pegasus, then, cloud-busting is actually a specialized skill which requires quite a bit of practice. Because it requires them to divert a large amount of their magic capacity into building up a high-energy discharge of the water-binding magic, there will be a brief moment in which they will experience a "brownout" – or possibly even a full blackout! – of their flight magic as all the energy is diverted into building up and releasing the cloud-busting discharge. So a skilled cloud-buster will not only have to learn how to overcome that instinctive switchover, but they must also learn how to do so as rapidly as possible while remaining airborne with the absolute minimum amount of flight-magic energy, and keep a cool head during that brief moment when their flight magic cuts out.
Cloud-sculptors and construction workers, too, will need to learn to overcome that natural aversion to diverting energy away from flight – but not to as great an extent, since they will mostly be hovering in place or pushing things at relatively low speeds, and only need to maintain a steady, moderate flow of energy into the binding magic rather than try to build up a massive discharge, so there's little danger of a magic "blackout". (If one did occur, it would be because they overworked themselves, or got in a hurry and tried to force the cloud material to solidify too fast – and since the natural instinct would be for flight over water binding, the most likely result of such a "blackout" would be that whatever you were working on would simply fail to achieve cohesion and dissipate when the flow of water-binding magic was suddenly interrupted.)
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That made an extreme amount of sense. Fun how there are so many theories in the fandom about cute cartoon small horses